BURDETT-COUTTS, bfir-det' kr)Tits', AN GELA GEORGINA, Baroness (1814—). An English philanthropist, daughter of Sir Francis Burdett. In 1837 she inherited much of the property of her grandfather, Thomas C'outts, the banker. The liberal and public-spirited use she has made of this wealth, in her efforts to mitigate the suf ferings of her fellow-creatures and the lower animals, has rendered her name well known in England and America. Besides spending large sums in building and endowing churches and schools, she endowed the three colonial bishop rics of Cape Town. Adelaide, and British Colum bia, at an outlay of about £50,000, and founded an establishment in South Australia for the improvement of the aborigines. In her zeal for the good of her own sex she effected important. reforms in the teaching of girls at the national schools, and established a shelter and reforma tory for fallen women. To the city of London
she has presented, besides several handsome fountains, the Columbia Market, Bethnal Green, for the supply of good and wholesome food in a poor district. She also built Columbia Square, consisting of model dwellings at low rents for about 300 families; and. talking great interest in emigration, has assisted many poor families in their passage. 'ter private charities have been on a corresponding scale, and she is also a lib eral patroness of art. In 1871 she accepted a peerage from the Government, with the above title. In 1872 the freedom of the city of Lon don was conferred upon her (the first woman who ever received it), and in 1874 the freedom of Edinburgh. She was married in 1881 to W. L..Ashmead-Bartlett (born in New -Jersey), who by royal license used the surname Burdett Coutts.